Jose Mourinho has urged England boss Gareth Southgate to look at the example set by Chelsea this season as the Three Lions aim to beat Germany.
The two nations do battle at Wembley Stadium later today with a place in the Euro 2020 quarter-finals the prize for the victor.
It goes without saying then that Southgate will be attempting to outwit World Cup winning manager Joachim Low throughout the game, and Mourinho has suggested that Thomas Tuchel may have set the blueprint for victory in Chelsea's Champions League final win against Manchester City.
Speaking to talkSPORT, he said: “If you go in the direction of Chelsea, just to give you the last example because they play the Champions League final of course.
“They played with the back five. That allowed (Kai) Havertz, (Timo) Werner and (Mason) Mount to be in positions where they weren’t chasing (Manchester) City full-backs.
“They were just focused on what was on front of them and occupying the spaces.”
The parallels between the Three Lions and the Blues are easy to compare, with both managers regularly deploying a back-three.
It was rumoured prior to the game that Southgate was set to use this system anyway.
However, Chelsea duo Mason Mount and Ben Chilwell appear unlikely to start. The pair only recently finished their period of self isolation having come into contact with Blues’ teammates Billy Gilmour who tested positive for COVID-19 last week.
Meanwhile, a couple of the Germany players could be set to hand Low an insight to the Chelsea and thus England system.
Each of Timo Werner, Kai Havertz and Antonio Rudiger started the game, with the latter two playing the full 90 minutes.
